Finale 27 is 'coming soon'

[JoshNichols]

Ben, this is way off the topic, but can Dorico now do centered beaming for intervals smaller than a fourth without a workaround?

No.

[benwiggy]

But after these few years with Dorico I come to the result that I should better not wait everything from it and if Finale can do the other things that I need then well, why not use Finale for these other things.

Yes, of course: use the right tool for the right job. If you need a cutaway score today, then you need to use Finale today.

Ben, this is way off the topic, but can Dorico now do centered beaming for intervals smaller than a fourth without a workaround?

You mean like this? It's one drag in Engrave mode.

Screenshot 10.png (26.95 KiB) Viewed 5692 times

[John Ruggero]

Thanks, Josh.

Ben, the stem is on the wrong side of the second eighth note.

It needs to be like this:

centered beam.jpeg (13.9 KiB) Viewed 5688 times

[benwiggy]

Here you go:

Steps are:

1. Create a new NoteHead Set, with a duplicated Black Notehead.
2. Move the "Stem Connections" (as Finale would call them) to the opposite sides of the notehead.
3. Drag the beam.
4. Apply the Notehead.

Screenshot 13.png (24.15 KiB) Viewed 5678 times

Once set-up, it's then only steps 3 and 4.

So, a bit of work, but no more so than lots of 'Special Tool' work in Finale with Beams. The beam's thickness does seem to vary depending on spacing and angle, but I'm not sure quite how.

[John Ruggero]

Yes, that is the workaround that Daniel kindly provided when I brought this up a couple of years ago. But I was wondering if it had been corrected so that one didn't need the workaround.

What the OP expressed resonated strongly with me.

As a Dorico outsider, I am mystified by such a limitation, and as a potential user, concerned. Even when it was shown that there are numerous examples of centered beaming for small intervals in the literature (In fact I ran into it with the first piece I tried to engrave in Dorico) this limitation apparently hasn't been corrected yet. One hopes that it will be. But when?

A similar instance came up recently where all figured bass numbers from 2-9 could be slashed except 3 and 8. Dorico research had shown that these figures are uncommon. But so are a lot of things in music notation, like centered beaming of small intervals. Wouldn't it have been less time-consuming to include the two numbers and forget research that can never be conclusive? I would imagine that the user who actually needed the slashed 3 for his work would have been much more impressed to see it there than not. And I don't think he would have thought less of Dorico to see the slashed 8.

[benwiggy]

More instances are always more time consuming. There are already, c. 3000 glyphs in SMuFL, and I dare say that you could add another 1000 just to 'complete the set' of composite symbols. The "last 5%" of notation probably requires exponentially more work, so some pragmatic cut-off is required.

You can always just use text, at worst.

Without wishing to appear a hopeless apologist, is this beaming found in 'modern' scores? Or is it purely to duplicate beaming from older engraving?

I'll agree that Dorico does provide so much help that when it does say "no", it's all the more annoying.

But if 'having to use workarounds' was a bar to using software....

[John Ruggero]

Here is a typical example of centered beaming of a second in Brahms Piano Piece op. 119 no. 1:

Brahms op 119 no 1.jpeg (20.77 KiB) Viewed 5661 times

[benwiggy]

But how old is that edition? Do modern editions do the same, or do they use a more 'standard' beaming, and offset the noteheads? (Not because they can't, but because they prefer it.)

[David Ward]

But how old is that edition? Do modern editions do the same, or do they use a more 'standard' beaming, and offset the noteheads? (Not because they can't, but because they prefer it.)

I'm curious to know what it is you would consider the more standard beaming with offset noteheads for this.

I'm not much of a pianist, but if I were to write this in manuscript I might do it as shown and then struggle to realize it in the software. I still seem more fluent in manuscript that on a computer, even after twenty years of using Finale.

[John Ruggero]

That example is from the standard Breitkopf and Hartel Complete Works of Brahms.

Yes, modern editions do the same, (like the Henle I just checked) because it is the is best way to write it. Such beaming is an integral part of our notational system and seen in numerous works. That's why it is very strange to me that it is not included in Dorico natively and why they wouldn't correct it once brought to their attention.

David, it is easily done in Finale. viewtopic.php?f=3&t=148